
FT MEADE 
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J 


















MADNESS IN MUSIC 








MADNESS 
I N 

MUSIC 


BY 

HARRIET GALE CARTER 

M 



♦ 

MACON, GEORGIA 

THE J. W. BURKE COMPANY 


^72. 





COPYRIGHT 1940 BY S 

HARRIET GALE CARTER , A|3 


im 

cu tl l 


C-ClA 1 48527 




RECEIVED 

DEC 3 01940 

COPYRIGHT OFFICE 





n v 3/*/*/ 


TO MY MOTHER 















“A poem should be motionless in time 
As the moon climbs, 

Leaving, as the moon releases 
Twig by twig the night-entangled trees, 

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves, 
Memory by memory the mind. 

A poem should be motionless in time 
As the moon climbs.” 


—Archibald MacLeish 











The best of luck to you and your poetry, 
which I honestly think is exceptionally good 
and which I hope you will continue to write. 
With best wishes, 

James E. Warren, Jr.* 


*Mr. Warren was the 1937 winner of the national annual $100 
prize awarded by the Poetry Society of America for the best 
poem of the year written by a member, one of the most coveted 
awards in American literary circles. His winning contribution 
was his five stanza effort, “Final Lightning.” Mr. Warren’s 
verse has appeared in New York Times, New’ York Sun, Lit¬ 
erary Digest, North American Review, Verse Craft, Voices, 
Poetry Magazine, The Golden Magazine (England) and other 
publications. 

























































CONTENTS 


NOMADISM. 

NIGHT THOUGHT. 

LIBRARY. 

I THANK GOD. 

OLD VIENNA. 

GRAIN FIELD. 

IF YOU SHOULD DIE. 

WHAT AN UNWORTHY TEMPLE! . . . 

PASTORAL . 

SPRING HAUNTS THE BATTLEFIELD . 

INCREDULOUS . 

AFTERNOON . 

TAPS. 

LET US HAVE LAUGHTER. 

INDIAN SONG. 

THE IDLER . 

KISSES. 

STRANGE BORDER-LAND. 

WHEN YOU PASS BY. 

TENNIS COURT. 

AFTER . 

I TURN TO YOU. 

PRAYER BEFORE AN OPERATION . . 

VIGNETTE: LOVE. 

TOSCANINI. 

INVASION. 

MADISON, GEORGIA. 

WORDLESS . 

INSEPARABLE . 


Page 

. 1 
2 

. 4 
5 

. 6 
7 

. 8 
. 9 
. 10 
. 11 
. 12 
. 13 
. 14 
. 15 
. 16 
. 17 
. 18 
. 19 
. 20 
. 21 
. 24 
. 25 
. 26 
. 27 
. 28 
. 29 
. 30 
. 32 
. 33 


































Page 

EVERYONE I MEET.36 

PAGLIACCI.37 

THE CALM WORLD.38 

SECRET.39 

THE FLEETING.40 

MOOD.41 

SMILE NEVER!.42 

MEMORIES.43 

WINTER LANDSCAPE.44 

ONE DAY WITH LOVE.45 

TO RUPERT BROOKE.46 

PRIDE.47 

WORLDLY WOMAN.48 

MY DEATH BED.49 

EAGLE NESTS.50 

ISAAC AND REBEKAH.51 

MIRROR LESSON.52 

RAINBOW.53 

MARIE ANTOINETTE ..54 

STRANGE DAWN.55 

PHOENIX.56 

FAITH.57 

I LOVE TO HEAR.58 

LAKE AT DAWN.59 

TO A PHILOSOPHER.60 

DISTANCE.61 

BACK TO NATURE.62 

SPRING.63 

UNTAMED.64 

FUNERAL.65 

WHEN I AM OLD.66 

LEST THE FRAGRANCE FAINT.67 




































Page 

EVENTIDE.68 

MUSE ON A BEACH.69 

STEPPING STONES.70 

REMINISCENCE.71 

TROUT STREAM.72 

LIST.73 

SOLITARY WALK.74 

DESIRE IN MOONLIGHT.75 

GOD BENDS ABOVE THE BATTLEFIELD ... 76 

PARTING.77 

SO MUCH TO LOVE.78 

THE CONNOISSEUR.79 

A CHILD’S FOURTH OF JULY.80 

TO MY FUTURE HUSBAND.81 

ELMS.82 

MY CROSS.83 

APRIL SHOWER.84 

LOQUACITY.85 

GRANDMOTHER’S TALES.86 

ECSTASY.87 

AS THE WIND IS BORN.89 

WHAT YOU’VE TAUGHT ME.90 

THE SOUL OF A DOG.92 

NOCTURNE.93 

HUMAN FALLIBILITY.94 

SPRING TREES.95 

HOUSEWIFE’S PRAYER.96 

POET’S WISH.97 

COUNTRY WALK.98 

THE ENEMY IN WAR.99 

MARY’S CHILD (A Christmas Poem ) .100 

LUXURY.101 



































Page 

DEEP WONDER.102 

LOVELORN.103 

LINES FOR ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING . 104 

RETURN.105 

RAIN.106 

DRAMA.108 

TO HITLER.109 

ORGAN AT TWILIGHT.Ill 

INFANTILE VERACITY.113 

EXIT.114 

THE HOUSE LOVE BUILT.116 

WAR.117 

WOMAN OR LADY?.119 

FOR GOD AND ME.120 

A HANDSHAKE.121 

MIRTH IN MY DIRGE.122 

THIS HUMAN STRENGTH.123 

ENVIRONMENT.124 

SCIOLISM.125 

GOD, YOU ARE STRANGE.126 

YOUR VOICE.127 

NO RESENTMENT.128 

A GREEN SWEATER.129 

AS FRIENDS WE COME.130 

EVACUATION.131 

LOST POEM.133 





























I am hysterical with song, and I 

Grow clamorous with life’s medley. One day 

My song is red; the next day it is gray, 

As I see life in colors flashing by. 

Into a poem wreath I twine moonlight 
And darkness, sun and rain, water and wine; 
Laughter and tears splash from this pen of mine- 
Madness in music—this is what I write. 


—The Author. 








MADNESS IN MUSIC 















NOMADISM 


I am thirsty for old rivers of great name— 

The Danube and the Volga and the Seine; 

To every harbor light I have laid claim. 

I must be free as houseless stars for rain 
In India has haunted me too long; 

I am in love with all the world—the blue 
Of Switzerland, Egyptian nights like strong 
Black coffee, and French castles, grim, untrue. 

Oh, I shall walk through the galleries of man, 
And whet my heart upon new strange hearts 
and, 

So typically the cosmopolitan, 

I, when I turn my face to the Last Great Land, 
Shall know well, as before, in the depths of me 
That I go with old curiosity. 


(1) 




NIGHT THOUGHT 


Upon this late, cold, dripping night I hear 
Rain’s tiny hammers hit the far-up roof 
With drowsy strokes, and I am here aloof 
From worlds outside—my room a little sphere. 

My walls are darkened barriers on which 
Soft flickers, like slim demons, leap and dance— 
My low fireplace an orangy expanse 
Of molten gold, and I am snugly rich. 

This bright inferno holds my drowsy gaze, 

My eyes explore its glowing, deep ravines, 

Its seething caverns, and the myriad scenes 
And patterns in the melancholy blaze. 

The blood within the embers oozes now, 

The coals, like aging men, are streaked with gray; 
Outside the cold wet oaks yearn on for May, 
And still the meek rain soaks each lilac bough. 


(2) 




God, I can stand the day—the shining light, 

Light—bright as silver snow and children’s eyes— 
But when the warm lit sky is stained with dyes 
Of deep dead onyx—how I loathe the night! 

In day my lustful duties grasp my brain— 

Seduce it from my yet untarnished dreams, 

But night, the tender rain, and firelight gleams 
Bind me; I hold a tryst with love’s old pain. 

To memories I have whispered iron good-byes, 
And prayed the mist of time would cloud the pain, 
But somehow through the chaste and gentle rain, 

I hear your silenced voice and see your eyes. 


( 3 ) 




LIBRARY 


This deep, dim library, this quiet room 

Of books and shelves and shadows soft with dust, 
Dreams out the afternoon in mouldy gloom. 

Long twisted boughs across the windows rust 
With blood-red maple leaves mellowed with age. 

The sun zigzags the floor with autumn gold— 
The only stir the turning of a page. 

Here books, read and reread, mildewed and old, 
Or new with crisp white paper sleep together 

With covers like drawn blinds around themselves. 
The fiery gilt-gold letters on red leather 

Burn on the volumes humped up down the shelves. 
And hushed within this vault, this dim archive, 

A thousand souls are buried here alive. 


( 4 ) 




I THANK GOD 


I thank God so for everything you’ve meant, 

I thank God for the hours we have spent, 

I thank God they have brought me strange content— 
I thank God! 

I thank God for the memories I keep, 

I thank God that you taught me love was deep, 

I thank God what we’ve felt was never cheap— 

I thank God! 

I thank God for the things that knit us two— 

That you fit in my moods the way you do— 

But mostly for the miracle of you 
I thank God! 


( 5 ) 




OLD VIENNA 


Hearts were more than hearts. Inconstant, vain 
Vienna was unreal when chandeliers 
Trembled with light in ballrooms where champagne 
And light and music surged. The whirling tiers 
Of silk and satin, taffeta and lace 

Bent to the painted waltzes Strauss had dreamed, 
Frivolous with coquetry and grace— 

Warm was the ardor where the Danube gleamed. 

Intoxicating ladies laughed and sighed, 

And watched their wide skirts furiously spin; 
Their men, moulded in uniforms, would glide 
To the balcony. They stood dissolving in 
Kisses that bubbled in their veins like wine, 

Kisses drunk swiftly, drunk like beer from stein. 


( 6 ) 




GRAIN FIELD 


A tawny bay of grain, a shimmering tide 

Curves inland down the meadow coast to lap 
The headlands of the frontier sky. The wide 
Bright country landscape is a crayoned map 
A child discarded. White farm houses crouch 
In puddles on the distant cluttered floor 
Of farmlands. Tipsy fences reel and slouch 

Against the lamp-post trees. And down the shore 
Of pastureland the sunlight wades knee-deep 
In grain shoals and coagulates in shade. 

Stagnant as slag the grain lies coiled asleep 
Sunning itself, its scales flashing like jade. 

What is so blond as sunlight deep in grain, 

So bright as the red clay beaches of the plain? 


(7) 




IF YOU SHOULD DIE 


If you should die and they would bring flowers 
To cover you like all our fragrant hours, 

I know I should be much too stunned to cry— 
But shrivel to cold stone as time went by. 

How could I laugh with great finesse and hide 
Tumultuous chaos raging so inside ? 

But oh, I’ll stop to think—you’re watching me! 
And 1 shall don such shining bravery! 


(8) 




WHAT AN UNWORTHY TEMPLE! 


What an unworthy temple, Lord, for Thee! 

I am embarrassed much to ask Thee in. 

Apologies are vain for what You see 
Is my own fault, my lack of care, my sin, 

Ill-kept—untidy—such a wretched home ! 

But Thou, perhaps, wilt make it new and clean, 

As though washed in the pools of old Siloame, 

For Thou didst ever love the low and mean 
And unattractive places. Thou didst pass 
Along the dirty lanes of Palestine, 

Through flies blowing the sores of many an ass, 
Through dogs that licked the lepers, through the 
swine— 

All these were blessed, anointed with Thy face. 
Behold my poor vile heart and its disgrace! 


(9) 




PASTORAL 


Hushed in a mountain meadow, green and deep, 

Soft with the summer sun above the dells, 

We lay and watched the slow, white clouds of sheep 
Dreaming on mountainsides, heard quiet bells, 
And gathered flowers in the deep, tall grass— 

Cool as the still, blue sky the gentian’s breath. 
Tufted with snow, the mountain’s jagged mass 
Of granite steeples sharpened dark as death. 

A shepherd piped above us. Afternoon 
Faded to shadows as we rose and kissed, 

Turned to the village wakeful with the moon, 

And climbed down mountains webbed in lilac mist. 
I knew more light than sun and moon could shed— 
In your sea-blue eyes, your lovely golden head. 


(10) 




SPRING HAUNTS THE BATTLEFIELD 


Spring haunts thq battlefield—a silent ghost. 

There is no thundering gun, no screaming shell, 

No ugliness and hurt, no hate and hell— 

Only the whispers of the grasses toast 
A, victory—a conquest greater far 
Than armies of the earth can ever claim. 

Spring mends the splintered tree. There is no maim, 
No rent along the shell-torn slopes, no scar 
Upon the squandered land, lonely and still. 

There are no browned, scorched fields. Death is a 
dream. 

A peaceful bridge arches a crystal stream, 

And apple blossoms softly rim a hill. 

After the angry bayonet and gun, 

Quietly sleep the dead under the sun. 


(11) 




INCREDULOUS 


I want to think you love me, to believe 
Your words are true, and knowing how sincere 
You are, I should not doubt nor have one fear. 
And yet I cannot realize, conceive 
The fairy tale of your warm love for me—« 

It seems a thing I dreamed, a fancied glow, 
Forgive me if I think it is not so— 

My understanding reels and is at sea. 

Besides, your ardor should be spent on one 
More lovely and more worthy of your charms— 

A gift by gross mistake thrust in my arms. 

You are my own? I am confused and stunned. 

As Heaven seems impossible, too grand, 

So are your words, your earnest eyes, your hand. 


(12) 




AFTERNOON 


I have known the afternoon, the changing light, 
The copper sun, the gilded, stagnant hours, 

The hot air swimming with the molten showers 
Of sun-drops, smouldering and pale and bright. 
Like a ripple of vague white fire, the thin sun smirks 
Behind the heart-shaped leaves, mad with a whim 
To dive through lilaced windows of some dim 
Damp library flaking gold where darkness lurks, 

Or thrust an arm of dusty light down through 
Tall stained-glass windows of a church—an aisle 
For angel feet. Then with the quavering smile 
Of ancient age it sickens down the blue— 

Faded and arrogant, dropped on its knees, 
Drooping its rose-red plumes down through the 
trees. 


(13) 





TAPS 


My flags waved bravely high the day you came— 
A drum beat constantly—it was my heart; 

And strangely, though I didn’t know your name, 
Some voice inside me hinted of love’s start. 

And now a bugle blows at dusk as you 
Depart—it’s my lone cry to God above, 

A plea to understand sunset—dark blue— 

An evening star—a song—an ended love. 


(14) 




LET US HAVE LAUGHTER 


Let us have laughter like the earth imparts, 

One song of bright exuberance to sing, 

One holiday of humor for our hearts, 

Like the abandoned mirth of dancing spring. 

For everywhere is high hilarity— 

A prattling brook, the repartee of birds, 

The radiant smile of dogs, the sun, the sea— 

Let us have laughter twining through our words. 


(15) 




INDIAN SONG 


Lovely and wild she ran like rain and rivers 
Barefooted through the forest. Swift and lean, 

A brave pursued her through the deepening green. 
Ruddy and strong and slick he gleamed. Bright 
slivers 

Of laughter curled across the drowsy hills 
As breathless she was captured in his arms, 

Copper and smooth and warm with all the charms 
Of the Indian evening soft with whippoorwills. 

Smoke from the wigwams writhed skyward and slow, 
And twilight was a legend. Through its sleep 
Remote drums chanted anguishedly and deep. 

The lover’s black eyes softened. She bowed low 
Her head upon his naked breast and he 
Trampled her mouth with his in one long plea. 


(16) 




THE IDLER 


You are a rushing and an anguished one, 
Spending your fuel in the pushing crowds; 
I am an old disciple of the sun, 

I lie and watch the pantomime of clouds. 


(17) 




KISSES 


Kisses are such funny things! 

They flutter down like birds— 

But off they flit on sudden wings 
More volatile than words. 

How memory forgets the taste, 

And clamors to encore it! 

But oh, it’s such a wretched waste— 
With nothing to show for it! 


(18) 




STRANGE BORDER-LAND 


Strange border-land between the soul and God! 

Whereon we set our faces, gauge our days, 

And dare approach it boldly, courage-shod, 
Uncertain of the vague, the unproved haze. 

Oh dim horizon, shadowed, empty verge ! 

Out of a void of death we waked in birth— 
Now we return, yet staunchly, for we merge 

Our essence more with God than with the earth. 


(19) 




WHEN YOU PASS BY 


To look up suddenly into your face 
I am a spirited colt inside, and oh, 

My slow, deliberate heart sets such a pace 
I think it may leap from me! You may know 
This strange, quick change and think it just a riddle, 
But if you guessed my love you might know why 
I throb just like the plucked strings of a fiddle, 

Quite giddy and upset when you pass by. 

A torch flares up within me, and the blaze 
Burns higher every moment you are near, 

And lower as you walk out of my gaze. 

I watch you go, and when you disappear, 

The fire goes out except a curling trace 
Of smoke that is the memory of your face. 


(20) 




TENNIS COURT 


The sun drizzles through leaves of trees 
And pours in torrents 
On the flat tan court, 

Riotously. 

It looks for a moment 
Abrupt— 

Intent— 

And with final decision 
Lies down in the sand 
In a great white heap— 

Sound asleep. 

I think it loves the quiet court 
By its crazed, wild surge— 

And the brown players in white. 

It searches their quick, tense eyes 
With a brazen white stare, 

And slides down 
Polished bronze muscles 
Of crouched, expectant legs. 


(21) 




The soft whack of balls 
Is the single sound 
That invades 

The sleepy afternoon stillness— 
Stillness like syrup. 

Somehow 

The moon strangely loves the court— 
With a cold, white, passionless devotion, 
And with magnificent dignity— 

(Quite unlike the impetuous sun). 

The regal moon 
Lays her soft cheek 
Against the tired sand, 

And smooths out its wrinkles 
With her limp, swan-like hands, 

Sheer 

Like fragile magnolias, 

And sweeps off 

Like a great lady 

To let down her long white hair 

On the tops of trees. 


(22) 





And the net across the court— 
Slumping a little— 

Is a ghostly yarn 
Of spun spider lace— 

Thin, 

Motionless, 

And vaguely white 
In the dark. 


(23) 




AFTER 


After love is gone and the 1 debris stands 
Bleak, alone, there is a strange calm peace 
Like desperate prayer brings; and with willing hands 
One fashions life anew. Resigned release 
Of dreams and tears, excitement and the pain, 
Makes love seem quite impossible—unreal; 

One feels so tranquil, dignified, and sane— 

No more indignant for the wounds will heal. 

After the thrill is dead and the pain remote, 

There’s a pensive looking back with a little smile 
Of mellow understanding to denote 

Amusement, perhaps, or the great long while. 
After the storm has left an awful track, 

There is the quiet, hopeful building back. 


(24) 




I TURN TO YOU 


I turn to you if living is all pain— 

If all I do seems useless and in vain, 

And I have more than one heart can contain, 
Dear friend, 

I turn to you. 

And then I turn to you if I’m bubbling 
With sudden joy, when winter is made spring, 
And I must have someone to hear me sing, 

Dear friend, 

I turn to you. 

I need to see your eyes—to feel your hand— 

To watch your slow smile—hear your voice so 
bland; 

God bless you, dear, you always understand, 
That’s why 

I turn to you. 


(25) 




PRAYER BEFORE AN OPERATION 


God hear my prayer and quiet all my fright 
As I go in an ether purgatory 
And trust my life to bending men in white, 

Whose flashing knives will presently grow gory 
In silent hands. Those rubber-gloved, strong hands 
Will need Thee, too, God. Let them never slip. 
Guide nurses listening to low, brief commands 
And give them steady and unflustered grip. 

If there is shipwreck in that opal mist, 

And I cannot emerge—cannot awake 
Among white walls and strange fumes I’ve a tryst 
With Thee—this much I know without mistake. 
It is Thy choosing now which life is mine, 

And if I wake up in a world divine. 


(26) 




VIGNETTE: LOVE 


Love is a poor little urchin 
Crying at the kitchen door 
Of a human heart. 

And oh, there are big open doors 
With sunlight rippling through 
On the clean-swept floors, 

Where the tired little beggar 
In rags and dirt— 

Cold and hurt— 

Finds full sustenance. 

And oh, there are great selfish mansions 
With deaf, closed doors— 

Cold and immovable— 

Where he exhausts himself 
Crying for food. 

No answer. 

He will not stay and starve; 

He moves on 
To another door 
Hungry. 


(27) 




TOSCANINI 


Wild thunder in the hills in anguished roar, 
And avalanches mighty, treacherous, 

Uncouthly crashing down more riotous 
Than city traffic and more rude, will soar 
At Toscanini’s will, and violin bows 
Will grow articulate with sheer, thin sighs. 

A dream from their small, tender souls soon flys 
On treble wings pleading and pensive. Those 
Chords dragging heavy feet thickly stop short. 
A burst of jubilation, a mad snort 
Flares boisterously and dissolute. Then flows 
The tranquil horns. Sunbeams skip down a hill, 
And morning on the meadow lies so still. 


( 28 ) 




INVASION 


Oh, must you come into my heart 
And take me unawares— 
Suddenly leaving in your wake 
A thousand little cares? 

Yours is a flaming victory, 

I grandly fought and fell; 

Claim me, or next time I shall build 
A mighty citadel! 


( 29 ) 




MADISON, GEORGIA 


All yesterday and all tomorrow’g here. 

Behold these vain white columns, these austere 
Old mansions of the strong but sheltered hearts— 
With what erectness in their drear veneer. 

With what humility small houses speak 

Along the lanes. Their fresh red bricks are meek 
And lenient, yet proud, for they embrace 

A race that war and waste could not make weak. 

Here in the hush of cotton fields is peace 

And warmth and slow life like their whitening 
fleece; 

Here ancient oaks make tunneled avenues 
Of green tranquillity that will not cease. 


( 30 ) 




This sundial in this garden, that town clock 
Atop the courthouse tower counts to lock 
Away all pain in piled magnolia leaves, 

And time and fury in a buried crock. 

Oh, here the changeling and the valorous one 
May find a shrine to break their hearts upon; 
And rise uncringing, dauntless, and as strong 
As Bona Hall and sovereign Thurlston. 


( 31 ) 




WORDLESS 


There never was a poem that I made 
In tenderness but what I cast my scroll 
At the dear feet of you—a serenade 
Of words up to the window of your soul. 

I want to love you, dear, in words—in words! 

No candles have I that your eyes might see 
Into my heart’s deep room. Though thoughts in 
herds 

Stampede my brain they won’t come out of me. 


( 32 ) 




INSEPARABLE 


Lodged immovable 
In the soft mud 
Of my soul— 

The deep still mire— 

Like ships off islands, 

Are full moons and you— 

Inseparable. 

Bowls of yellowish-white 
Brimming at the edge 
Spill into the dark 
A vague whiteness— 

And below 

The crooked, calloused fingers of trees 
That joust with each other— 

Like maddened knights— 

Clutch and reach 
To hold in their hands 
The sallow face above; 

And buds— 

Half-open— 


( 33 ) 




On leafless pecans 
Peep around branches— 

Like elves— 

Their impudent heads 
Drenched 

In the curdling cold 
Of wind, 

While restless clouds— 
Young snowy nothingness— 
Like swift ice-bergs 
In a gray sea— 

Glide 

Amoeba-like 

Over the unblinking white 
Of moon. 

I imagine you are beside me, 
At my window— 

Seeing this— 

Our souls talking, 

Our bodies 
Blended in blackness, 

And the moon is putting silk 
Into your uplifted eyes. 


( 34 ) 




Yet 

There are centuries of moons, 
Interminable moons, 

They are running— 

Running— 

Like pick-pockets 
Racing through crowds of clouds 
Down the lamplit streets 
Of sky. 

And I am running— 

With a pulse-pounding madness, 
Reaching out frantic fingers 
For your love. 

You are a vapor 
Like those clouds— 

A moon 

That I can never touch. 


( 35 ) 




EVERYONE I MEET 


Let me find God in everyone I meet, 

Even in those who keep the lowest level, 

Knowing such poor, weak hearts are indiscreet, 
For man was made half God and half the devil. 

I am so quick to judge with such unkind, 

Cruel sentences. Oh, let me understand— 

Let me be tolerant. I am so blind, 

And it is hard to see on some His brand. 

Let me respect all those who pass my door— 

Those half-angels in differing degrees; 

Let me have faith in mankind more and more— 
Christ walks abroad within “the least of these”. 


( 36 ) 




PAGLIACCI 


Under my laughter 
Who knows the pain? 

The cold in the heart, 
The beat of the rain. 

Under my laughter 
Far out of sight, 

Wails a lone child 
Frightened with night. 

Over my laughter 
This is my crown: 

The lunatic mask 
Of a hideous clown. 


( 37 ) 




THE CALM WORLD 


Never forsake the calm world, oh my heart, 
For to abandon it is to sell the soul. 

Listen to beauty’s idyll, read her scroll, 

For the chameleon dawn is more than art, 

And woodland meadows by a peaceful stream 
That plaits a silver braid of flowing hair 
Will rest the weary traveler like a prayer. 

The silent places and a time to dream— 

These are true luxury, the only gain. 

The coming dusk soothes with its quiet repose, 
A book of poems cools the brow of woes, 

And mystic, moonlit nights are kind to pain, 
Who leaves the calm world and its gentle fold 
Knows poverty and famine and great cold. 


( 38 ) 




SECRET 


It’s strange the way that I conceal 
This love I have for you— 

Why, everything I ever feel 
I tuck away from view. 

I speak to you in careless tones, 

You never guess that I 

Have placed you on a million thrones, 
And set you in the sky. 

I talk of petty, trifling things— 

The weather or new books; 

My hand that clasps yours never clings— 
I cast such casual looks. 

My grave thoughts I have hidden, too— 
You see me flippant, gay; 

I never once look back at you 
When I saunter away. 

Sometimes I meet you as I go 
About—we smile and part; 

And so you pass and never know 
That lightning struck my heart! 


( 39 ) 




THE FLEETING 


A plane hoisted in sunset like black sails— 

An instant pattern for one glimpse allowed— 
Wantonly crossing blue and red-gold trails, 
Clinging around the armpits of a cloud. 

Now it is gone, a shining leaf soon whirled 
Off unpossessed, a startled deer that sped; 

So is it on this grounded human world— 

The heart’s fingers stretch out for what has fled. 


( 40 ) 




MOOD 


I wish you were a mood of mine 
To come and soon depart; 

But oh, without one farewell sign 
You hang around my heart! 

I cannot lose you though I’ve tried 
So very, very hard— 

You’re one mood that with all my pride 
I just cannot discard. 

You’re my worst habit that I would 
Break quickly, but today 

I can’t forget that you have stood 
Inside my heart’s doorway. 


( 41 ) 




SMILE NEVER! 


Smile never! You who turn on me and shine— 

Your face a lovely, outspread, painted fan 
Unfolding barren sunrise before mine. 

No luminary soul is in its span. 

Why, when I walk into the zone of you, 

Should you hand me an empty cup to share, 

Or rum of shimmering eyes that is untrue, 

When there’s no healing and no blessing there? 

You have not bothered yet to leave the door 
Of your strange heart ajar. I cannot feel 
That it’s a stove to warm my hands before. 

Oh, do not flood me with a fire unreal 
When I know and you feel that it’s a task! 

Better the cold, cruel phrase than the actor’s mask. 


( 42 ) 




MEMORIES 


Memories were meant for rainy nights. 

They dream deep in the molten gold of embers 

And sputter into flame. The heart remembers 

Still with a little sting when all the lights 

Are out for then the red-gold hearth becomes 

A sunset long ago. Thus memory 

Cobwebs a volume of old poetry 

Whose binding rats have almost knawed to crumbs; 

It is a dusty aura on the pages 

Of yellowed letters, and it softly hangs 

On city parks at night with little pangs, 

And mellowed gardens dreaming out the ages. 

So much awakens at a smile—like one 
That once meant all the world and all the sun. 


( 43 ) 




WINTER LANDSCAPE 


Crystal trees like diamond chandeliers 

Lie shattered in the lane. Oh what sweet pang 
To stare on lawn shrubs statuesque with tiers 

Of snow, to glimpse the world topped with me¬ 
ringue ! 


( 44 ) 




ONE DAY WITH LOVE 


One day with love is like a thousand springs. 

One is forever haunted by those hours 
Of laughter down a path of sunlit flowers, 

When, swift as darting cardinals, little stings 
Shot through two hearts so tremblingly aware 
Of the lovely truth they shyly left unnamed, 

When only flashes of the eyes proclaimed 
Sweet dreams, or when love shimmered in a stare. 

That was a poignancy nothing can transcend! 

One stood in the midst of time and thought, “Oh, 
here, 

Here for a golden moment he is near, 

Soon he will go, and this enchantment end”. 

Oh to imprison all the fragrant musk 
Of one day’s love, its sacred dawn and dusk! 


( 45 ) 




TO RUPERT BROOKE 


I sat in grief, your book upon my knees, 

And turned the pages musing on each leaf 
Bewildered, and I thought: so young, so brief 
In beauty till you scarce had time for these— 

And now by iridescent fields of sea 

You sleep, the scattered chaff, and this the wheat. 

But no—much more than wheat. Here on this sheet 

Are children of your soul, posterity 

Of all you knew, and these can never die. 

Your breath is in their lungs' and no defeat 
Can bruise their heels nor turn them in retreat. 

And now I cannot sigh and say you lie 
On Skyros island like a fallen god, 

The poetry of your bone in scrolls of sod. 


( 46 ) 




PRIDE 


You have your pride and I have mine, 
So let us smile and part; 

The stubborn two cannot combine— 
Not for a broken heart. 

So strong the barriers inside, 

Our proud hearts cannot yield; 

Be glad there is no hurt to hide— 
Pride is a mighty shield. 


( 47 ) 




WORLDLY WOMAN 


Tinseled and tenuous, you know but little 

Of rose-gardenia life. Your hard, bright genus 
Is city-bred, a flower vain and brittle, 

A night-club anemone, a gaudy Venus 
Of chiseled steel gone mad with lights and laughter 
And screaming traffic where the spangled night 
Strews city-lights like sequins. You lust after 
A counterfeit existence bubble-bright. 

Your lush and blood-red mouth absently browzes 
Slow languid cigarettes and pink champagne, 
Where orchestras blare loud and a crowd carouses 
Till you with metal boredom show disdain. 

Is this your creed with innocence unused? 

Then simple, precious things make you amused. 


( 48 ) 




MY DEATH BED 


Slow, flickering like faded music, I 

Shall pause before 1 watch the sun go out, 

And call you to my bed that I may lie 

Liquid and crumbling within your brown, stout, 
Trembling arms with my pillow your breast. 

Death will be sparkling then and the brittle tick 
Of the stern, unyielding clock may try its best 
To harass me with its eternal click. 

More mystical than death is horrible 

Thel grandeur of your love will flood me while 
In the aching silence, dark and merciful, 

You watch noon flee my face, and with a smile 
You’ll sing to me, as usual, with great 
Bells in your throat until the hour is late. 


( 49 ) 




EAGLE NESTS 


Eagle nests on balconies of rocks 
Stand high like fortresses from sudden gusts 
Of tortured wind and all the weather’s lusts, 
And calmly house their puzzled eaglet flocks. 

Eagle nests sit proud and adamant, 

Knowing a home of strength, a granite tower, 
Begets compelling victors with swift power 
Long pent-up for the grounded supplicant. 


( 50 ) 




ISAAC AND REBEKAH 


He watched the golden caravan depart 

Laden with gifts, and prayed it would not falter. 
Rebekah was the name etched on his heart— 

His bride for Sarah’s tent, his love’s young altar. 
Soon she would walk among the herds and flocks 
Of Hebron and sit long beneath the oaks, 

And she would flash her* smile and shake her locks, 
And softly, gently she would lift the yokes 
Of all his cares. One day across the sand 
The camels loomed. Hd lifted up his eyes. 

She shimmered there among the dusky band— 

Lo! She! the young, the beautiful, the wise, 
Who blushed and dropped her veil. Trembling he 
ran 

Across the fields to hail the caravan. 


( 51 ) 




MIRROR LESSON 


“I am a brave woman,” I said with pride, 

“One with a soul of steel to bear all things!” 

I marveled at my citadel inside— 

Invincible and ironclad to life’s stings. 

Care, Drudgery, and Pain had made me so— 

And it seemed Worry picked me to harass. 

I had borne more than all the world could know; 

I saw a strong face in my looking-glass. 

That very day a great wind gushed along 
And swept the flowers that I loved away. 
Bewildered, stripped of dreams, a woman strong 
Wept bitterly and humbly and that day 
Passing the mirror caught sight of a tear; 

The glass breathed out, “Look at yourself, my 
dear!” 


( 52 ) 




RAINBOW 


I watched a rainbow through my human tears, 
Stretching its peacock’s tail across the sky 
And, seemingly, across my futile years. 

It came as God’s magnificent reply 

To one whose heart was whimpering with rain, 
And blazed a trail to Him, a pastel aisle, 
Victorious and brave above my pain— 

And over my defeat I placed a smile. 


( 53 ) 




MARIE ANTOINETTE 


She pauses on the gilded, broad staircase, 

Dainty in her rose and gray brocade. 

The courtiers bow with handkerchiefs of lace 
Sweeping to the floor. She stands arrayed 
With sculptured, powdered hair. Her coquette smiles 
Flash like her jewelled breast. And down the stairs 
She glides out to the maze of garden aisles, 

Ablaze with red and yellow flowered squares. 

A fountain thrusts its sword-blade in the sun, 

And echoes laughter of a music-box. 

On marble seats she sits—a gilded one, 

A painted pastoral with powdered locks— 

And sighs between the flutters of her fan, 

And dreams of minuets—perhaps a man. 


( 54 ) 




STRANGE DAWN 


I watched spell-bound the strange dawn in your eyes 
Of candles that I never thought would burn; 

Old lights had fled; instead I could discern 
A thousand holy stars flicker and rise. 

My head was mad as rhumbas; and my throat 
Ached dully; all the dreams that I exiled 
Rushed back, hot, eager, panting, young and wild; 
In those still lakes I saw your soul afloat. 

There was the quiet of old English lanes 
Within them and the cool of twilight seas; 

But oh, the torches there refused to freeze, 

Or lose the tinseled shine of poured champagnes. 

I turned and sought the night, the trees, to stand 
In black lace shadows—and as tenderly 
As if a crucifix I held to me— 

Your love was resting in my trembling hand. 


(55) 




PHOENIX 


There is a glory in recovery— 

The convalescence of a broken heart, 

For courage was designed first by the art 
Of bitterness—and strength was never free. 

How beautiful the brave, the valiant ones! 

Their white hair and their faces etched and lined 
Like charts! How loving, tolerant and kind! 

Across the hour of need their calm strength runs. 

Most dreamers fall to earth with a broken wing, 
And blind men grope awhile starving for light— 
But break of day strikes through the long black 
night, 

And God who raged with winter soothes with spring. 


(56) 




FAITH 


I have a faith in love—a faith in love 
Untainted as white Mary, rose of God, 

Pure, clean as holy water, and above 

All, sheltered from man’s sacrilege. Like sod 
Is its freshness, solid abiding strength; 

It stands like rocks at sea from hands of fools; 
Eternity is meager by its length, 

And it is deep as moonlight in dark pools. 

Gentle and sensitive, it rises tall 

As a poet’s soul, and no less lovelier— 

And fragile as a woman’s heart with all 
The beauty of the motherhood of her. 

I have a faith in love—love without loss— 

Though once my love hung helpless on a cross. 


(57) 




I LOVE TO HEAR 


I love to hear a child’s low prayers, 
And laughter floating down the stairs, 
A waltz, a violin that grieves, 

The taffeta rustle of dry leaves, 

A surgeon’s clanking instruments, 

And boughs scraping on canvas tents, 
Wind in the trees before the rain, 
Sleet bombarding my windowpane, 

And birds at dawn, a fire alarm, 

Wild city traffic, “Liebestraum”, 

A plane, and Negroes who rejoice, 
Low thunder in the sea, your voice. 


(58) 




LAKE AT DAWN 


Pink in the marble lake the cold dawn quivers 
Across the trembling ripples to the line 
Of the tall, stiff grasses and the deep woodbine. 

A broad-hipped oak humped up and sagging shivers 
And swaggers in the wind. The cat-tails rust, 

Their scepters brown with dust. The hanging vines 
Immerse their muscled arms and crooked spines, 
Leaning too low across the water’s crust. 

The stars have dropped into the lake and drowned 
In the darkness, and sky is buried deep 
In the pale gray soul of it. You are asleep— 
Drowned in your 1 dreams, your hair waving around 
Your pillow in a pool. Soon you will wake, 

And it will stir and ripple like this lake. 


(59) 




TO A PHILOSOPHER 


You are a harbor that the gales have blown, 

And in your yearless heart white gulls have flown 
And silvered in the sunlight there. The tired, 

Slow homing boats have made your lone port 
known. 

And in your breast you keep old sailor’s tales 
Ready to tell, and songs to sing of sails 
Leathered from wind and storm upon their skins, 
And of great fish, the killer sharks and whales. 

You are a kindly beacon on the vast 

Uncertain tides, and I shall turn my mast 
And harken to your light and pass the reef; 

For I am not the first and not the last. 


(60) 




DISTANCE 


The distance to this evening star is less 

Than that which stands between us. Undressed space 

Floats measureless, and far beyond—your face— 

A light surrounded by dark loneliness. 

No cosmic miracle can yet impress 

That heart that it is loved untouched, unseen— 

The universe that stands gaping between 
Divides our worlds, and mine the wilderness. 


(61) 




BACK TO NATURE 


I shall turn my back on the world of man’s veneer, 
With its hard bright lights and tawdry neon signs, 
With its painted bill-boards where the high-ways 
smear 

Long woodland hills with artificial lines. 

I shall spurn with a stern disdain man’s gaudy world, 
For the gloom of deepening woods and spicy sod, 
For the sunny meadows by a stream unfurled— 

I shall turn my steps into the gardens of God. 


(62) 




SPRING 


Today spring breathed fresh green onto my lawn. 

I shall sit on my terrace listening to 
The white song of dogwoods. This speechless dawn 
Of new life wandered down my avenue 
Unheard. I turned to see the squill’s blue heads, 
Blond sunlight splashing on white porches—now 
Lying in pools in saintly iris beds, 

Vines in chaos, and a new apple bough. 

And you are spring to me—all that it means 
To a faded winter world. You are new green 
To my dry brown soul. And my spirit leans 
To yours as lithe buds seek the sun to glean 
Its gold. Oh, I pray to the God of all 
Springs, “Keep our love this—let not winter call”. 


(63) 




UNTAMED 


Barefooted I was one lamplit and strong, 
Detached from adult cares, modeled for play, 
Intrepid, marking time to childhood’s song 
With mischief and a will not to obey. 

Shoeshod I struggle disciplined and set 
In strict appointment with the day’s duty; 

And in bound, weary ceremony yet 

The child, the little beast, blurts out in me. 


(64) 




FUNERAL 


This is your funeral. You died today, 

Although you walk and smile and toss your head, 
You are a corpse to my eyes—you are dead. 

At last my insane love has flown away. 

Oh many the times you brought tears to my eyes, 
But now I can not weep. There is no pain. 

When love is killed, its life knows no regain— 
Love has no resurrection once it dies. 


(65) 




WHEN I AM OLD 


When I am old it will be good to rest— 

A dusty, cracked antique set in my niche 
Somewhere about the house. I shall be rich 
Reading neglected books. I shall be blessed 
To sleep long in the sun, my head sunk back 
On the strong male shoulders of a great armchair. 
Life will be soft and still and like a prayer. 

Out in the garden roses shall not lack 
My care in dewy mornings, and the dog 
And I will meet outside the garden gate 
To take long walks. Then by my window late 
At sundown I shall watch the sad gray fog 
Veil all the city lights, and it will creep 
Over my memories and give me sleep. 


(66) 




LEST THE FRAGRANCE FAINT 


Love knows not reason. Why explain, define 
Its fabulous design, its very germ? 

But let it burst in bloom and freely twine, 

For the most precious spurns the labelled term. 

Oh never analyze your love, my heart, 

Inquire not for the mystic formula, 

Nor seeking tear the petalled rose apart, 

Lest all the fragrance faint, the beauty scar. 


(67) 




EVENTIDE 


Slowly the walls of sky burn down and gloam, 
Lank grasses in the wind salaam and nod— 
As herds in the lap of fields file off for home, 
My heart at twilight finds the fold of God. 


(68) 




MUSE ON A BEACH 


There is a moon-aisle in the sea tonight— 

A flashing, twinkling trail—a road of stars 
Down through a sweep of water black and bright; 

These last lone winds are sad, whining guitars, 
Oh sweet, forsaken winds—they are my balms. 

I watched the sea soak up the sun today, 

Till twilight smoked the tousled heads of palms— 
This hungry sea soon nibbled off each ray. 

And now I walk the beach—far in the night, 
Breathing to stars how much I want your love; 

I feel it more tonight, and with the might 
Of sea—great as this blue prairie above. 

O heart, only a dreamer understands 

You and your silly love—these foam-fringed sands. 


(69) 




STEPPING STONES 


I walk on islands in a sea of grass, 

On white rocks that have weathered rain and sun; 
And every blurring twilight time I pass 
I count the silly series one by one. 

Within my home I shut the door and pause 
To curse this horrid soul of muddy clay, 
Repenting, counting—while the hot pain gnaws— 
The many hearts I’ve walked on through the day. 


(70) 




REMINISCENCE 


Down on my father’s farm when I was young, 

I watched the autumn moon settle upon 
The chicken yard. Frosty and red it hung 

There framed in peach tree limbs. Then one by one 
The white hens in the shed turned specter hosts 
As moonbeams touched them, and two turkeys 
bold 

Stood tall above the arbor like black ghosts. 

I watched their silhouettes against the cold 
Night sky and marveled at that moon-struck pair. 

And I recall the gourd vines sketched upon 
The fences like strange skeletons put there 
To scare my childish heart—I would not run. 

I could not go to bed and leave the sight— 

That silver-tipped and chill October night. 


(71) 




TROUT STREAM 


The mountains stand and dream but never they— 

These strong young children from the wilds of 
dawn, 

Who bounding up the stairs of falls and spray 

Have claimed a cold clear stream where they may 
spawn. 

I think some clueless planet knew the reign 
Of this quartz race now here in caravan, 

That they like flash of swords should so disdain 
The monarchy of artful, unkind man. 


(72) 




LIST 


Here is a list of what a woman loves: 

Geraniums red as sunrise, sea-shore sand, 

The strong, coarse scent of ground coffee, and pray¬ 
er, 

Eyes, and their eloquence, the shocking glare 
Of sunlight after sleep, the way men stand, 

Carrots with mermaid bodies, children’s swings, 
And children playing in the garden trees, 

Vows, deep wine-red plush, and after these— 
Perfumes, discreet and soft—dear, ancient things— 
Antiques, and the rich, lush feel of draperies, 

The gentle things—the parted lips of flowers, 
Whispers of night-rain, and the deep, still hours 
Of love and longing, poems, melodies, 

And kitchen sights—red jam, the dimpled pores 
In cheese, the even teeth of corn on cobs, 

And kitchen sounds-—especially the sobs 
Of dripping water faucets—little chores 
That fill days to the brim, cookbooks, and then 
The jingle of ice in glasses, the clenched fists 
Of cabbage—memories that come in mists— 

The strange soul of a room—and, perhaps, men. 


(73) 




SOLITARY WALK 


I walk alone when the world’s alone and still, 
When evening deepens down the moors of sky, 
And crags of lathered clouds swirled westward lie 
Like island slopes. A rail fence climbs a hill. 

The sun burns out and leaves me here alone 
To raise my own voice in me. I am free 
To hear the beat of heart and feet, and be 
An undivided thing. I am my own. 

Night, cold and whispering, suffuses gloom. 

A clock with two bright eyes against the sky 
Stares like a lover from afar. The high, 

Dark world is a mausoleum, an empty womb. 

I loiter in the lane for as I pass, 

I hear God breathing deeply in the grass. 


(74) 




DESIRE IN MOONLIGHT 


The moon’s solemnly white 
And shining sadly, 

I want you so tonight— 

So very badly! 

My heart would be a kite 
Up flying gladly, 

If you loved me—and quite 
A little madly. 


(75) 




GOD BENDS ABOVE THE BATTLEFIELD 


God bends above the battlefield, so still 

And anxious through the silent, starlit night— 
Spreading his saving love across the chill 

Of trembling hearts that knock and pound with 
fright. 

God hovers on the hours before a raid, 

To comfort all the timorous who start 
At the cannon’s flare, the static serenade 
Of grim machine guns. So His mighty heart 
Keeps vigil on the fields breathless with death, 

And as the darkened moments pass He hears 
The prayers of men poured out with quick, tense 
breath. 

How He must long to free them from their fears! 
And looking deep into their earnest eyes, 

Surely God turns His head and softly cries. 


(76) 




PARTING 


A door closed—closing out the very sun, 

Not one peek can I have. It’s tightly barred 
Against more entrances, for what begun 
Was ornamental flame so bright it charred. 

Oh, I should shrug my shoulders, think it best, 
And grunt amusedly, or sigh a bit— 

But why should I forever without rest 

Hunt for a key when none are made to fit! 


(77) 




SO MUCH TO LOVE 


Life has the strangest little ways, 

But who can fret and sigh, 

When so much beauty fills our days 
With songs of earth and sky. 

Life has a thousand naughty whims— 

Its notions curse or bless; 

But all along our path there brims 
A world of loveliness. 

When life goes laughing through the earth, 
And smiles in skies above, 

Who cannot sing with joy and mirth 
When there’s so much to love. 


( 78 ) 




THE CONNOISSEUR 


I am a connoisseur of every love— 

The warm security and strength, the blessed, 
The bitter loss, the tragic second best, 

The love of virtue, plain and yet above 
The love of beauty with its stricken eyes, 
The transient and the tarrying, the bold 
And shy, the understood and the untold 
Mystery of love beyond surmise. 

And suddenly it it not worth the while— 
The insane bliss, anxiety and fears, 

Perhaps indifference and midnight tears, 
And thinking of it thus I only smile— 

But meeting you I, who was wiser then, 
Unravel all this madness once again. 


( 79 ) 




A CHILD’S FOURTH OF JULY 


We were just children finding an excuse 
To celebrate and play a newer game— 

Such little hearts could not have known of truce 
And independence. Ah, but just the same 
There never were such patriots as we— 

We marched in tom-tom time, and we would start 
The national anthem (just a bit off-key), 

Our strange newspaper hats coming apart— 

But even then our solemn grand parade 

Down all the side-walks in the neighborhood 
Had majesty. It was a real brigade. 

Flags wagged their tails above us. It was good 
To prate of peace not knowing and not glum, 

To sing and march when Johnny spanked his drum. 


(80) 




TO MY FUTURE HUSBAND 


I shall marry you because of this: 

We think and feel the same; your heart and mine 
Are much akin—not for the way you kiss, 

That your soft eloquence is past divine, 

Or that your touch makes me electric. These 
I shan’t consider. There’s a greater thing. 

Your looks, however stunning, will not please 
Me, nor the way you laugh or dance or sing. 

My dear, the inner you, the heart, the mind 
Beyond your outer charms will fascinate 
Me always. And some mornings you will find 
Fond poems I have slipped into your plate, 

For if you love all truth and gentle beauty, 

My loving you will never be a duty. 


( 81 ) 





ELMS 


Oh for the elms, sculptored in music, deep 
In reverie! A surf of quivering jade 
Tangled with sun-silt, dim with cloistered shade 
Around the monk-like bark. Lordly they sleep 
Like old philosophers in brooding dreams— 

A confidence in great eternal things 
Upon them, and a courage in their wings— 

A sermon and a poem with the themes 
And texts man fashions all his mute creeds with. 
Cool lifted hand beseeching with green prayers! 
My heart and I stand serious. Awe flares 
And smothers me like some enchanted myth. 
Lift, lift, my faith in April! Overwhelm 
My spirit like the quiet soul of an elm. 


( 82 ) 




MY CROSS 


Down in the little church in me, 

The cloister deep within, 

You were my shrine, my Calvary, 

And, ah, you were my sin. 

But softly down the arching way 
Of my cathedral heart, 

My dreams, like monks, will chant and pray 
And stealthily depart. 

So hard the road, so long the climb— 
Without you it is so: 

I stagger up the ways of Time— 

Beneath a cross I go. 


( 83 ) 




APRIL SHOWER 


This silver rain is one great ticking clock. 

Spring told me that its music is no dirge, 

But that behind a white, slumped garden rock 
Some snowy Easter lilies would emerge. 

This white-gold rain is one low, sleepy chant— 
A mumbled lullaby from April’s lips; 

I know God’s beauty soon will run rampant— 
Like Christ be resurrected from deep crypts. 

This bright quartz rain has taken full command 
All down my block, and it is cruel to rinse 
The ants’ brick-red volcanoes in the sand 
Away; but oh, it brings gardens of chintz! 


( 84 ) 




LOQUACITY 


The thousand tongues of heart and mind 
Stay busy with their views, 

Like gossiping old ladies armed 
With sewing-circle news. 

And listening to their voices, 

And their incessant din, 

I talked myself right into love, 

And then right out again. 


( 85 ) 





GRANDMOTHER’S TALES 


I listened patiently to every tale 

Grandmother told, and gallantly I bore 

Monotony. So many times before 

I’d heard them from her lips till they were stale— 

She was forgetful, being eighty-seven, 

And talked of the Civil War and life back then 
Until I’d hate to hear of it again. 

She loved the sorrows and the trace of heaven 
That streaked those days with little frowns and 
smiles. 

And yet, until I took her dear, worn hand, 

And stepped into that musty, magic land 
Of dreams, until I walked across the miles 
Of years, I did not know what life can bring, 

And how the past is such a lovely thing. 


( 86 ) 




ECSTASY 


Your soul is a cloud of moonlight, gray and deep, 
A fog of dream-smoke beautiful and fleet 
That trembles over me opaque as sleep, 

Breathing on my heart opium-sweet. 

Your soul is an ancient garden, dim with shade, 
Elaborate as roses by a pool— 

You creep on me like moss on marble sprayed 
With fountain-silver—sad, perfumed and cool. 

Oh, I inhale you, faded as you are, 

With your bright disintegration, and your lush 
Ripe wormwood thoughts, your mind’s gay, rich 
bazaar, 

Our moments elegant and red as plush. 


( 87 ) 




When you are near I whirl in rose-gray mist, 

I form and I dissolve a thousand times, 

And stagger with your hand that I have kissed, 
And drown within your laughter, low as chimes. 

Gather me to your palace with your eyes, 

Your brocade hair, your alabaster hands. 

Oh do not pour me out with many sighs, 

And turn my feet to more plenteous lands. 

Your spirit stifles me like minor tones 
Of a piano softly touched as blue, 

Dusk shadows deepen while the twilight moans, 
And my being aches with ecstasy of you. 


( 88 ) 




AS THE WIND IS BORN 


Dark weariness is charioted on arms 
Protesting and religious and so pale 
With dead sapphires, and crys high over farms 
And swamps and fields. Blue tyranny of hail 
Will smash down lattices of black-green moss 

Long stitched to cracks in gray, unhurried walls. 
I am indignant as I watch the loss, 

And walk dazed up and down my sheltered halls. 

Red, faithless banners of left, tattered leaves 
Must throb on warrior limbs, and thin, gray 
streams 

Must shudder in stiff ringlets. What sky grieves 
In moaning black that wind makes smoking dreams 
Soon splatter into mangled mud? All dies 
As the wind is born—worn laughter and dim sighs. 


( 89 ) 




WHAT YOU’VE TAUGHT ME 


You have taught me more 
Than any book could teach me; 
What you are 
Has done more for me 
Than any sermon 
I ever heard. 

Silently 

You have made me bigger, 
Higher than I was; 

Silently 
I am grateful. 

My life was a ditty 

That you made a symphony, 

Because I stopped for a moment 

And listened 

To the music of yours. 

My life was prose 
That you made poetry, 

Because through your eyes 

I saw beauty 

In the obscure places. 


( 90 ) 




Unknowingly 

You have sculptored my soul 
With your kind, lovely hands. 

You have carved the rude, rough part of it 
Into symmetry— 

The unlovely into the lovely. 

What others would have done 
With hammer and chisel 
You have done 
By being the person you are. 

All this you have wrought in my nature— 
And more, 

Because— 

No, I do not know why, 

I cannot say, 

Unless 

It is because 

You are the one I love. 


( 91 ) 




THE SOUL OF A DOG 


A dog has a soul and a seed of God, 
His love is his faith and creed— 

But Heaven has not one place for dogs, 
And I think it’s unfair indeed! 

A dog has not half man’s vice and sin, 
His pride nor his hate nor greed— 
But Heaven has not one place for dogs, 
And I think it’s unfair indeed! 

A dog is as meek as the lowly Christ, 

As ready to die or bleed— 

But Heaven has not one place for dogs, 
And I think it’s unfair indeed! 


( 92 ) 




NOCTURNE 


The swaying moonlight lulls the world to gray. 
Here is a moment on a hidden height 

For two lone souls before the savage day 

Steals this cloud-thing from out the glistening 
night. 

Remote and vague, caught high above the earth, 

We stand like shadowed echoes—hushed and 
steep; 

Oh, your love cannot bear dawn’s violent birth— 
Through sacred trees I count dreams like dead 
sheep. 


( 93 ) 




HUMAN FALLIBILITY 


The heart is so irrational! 

I’d live more perfect days 
If logical precision 

Could regulate its ways. 

A passion can upset it, 

A weakness take command— 

It’s wayward pulse will rise and fall 
Like sea against the land. 

I envy an existence 
Unbroken in accord— 

Life would have no surprises, 

But there’d be more reward. 

Some only need be shown a thing, 
They do it and they love it— 

I always know just what to do, 

But oh! the doing of it! 


( 94 ) 




SPRING TREES 


Once more young starlit leaves flutter and fly, 
Quivering like moth-wings on the thin, new spires 
Of nervous limbs that sway against the sky, 

Now irritable with birds long in their choirs. 

Summer will have a deeper, sane design, 

But the subtile, the illusive has begun— 

In lace and organdy the spring trees shine, 

Shaking their curled, blond ringlets in the sun. 


( 95 ) 




HOUSEWIFE’S PRAYER 


Give me Thy face, O Christ, to wear today, 

Lest I should frown if my roast burns—Thy joy 
That every salesman, beggar, grocer boy 
Will see Thy smile—and children in from play. 

Thy calm white patience, kindness, love, I ask— 
And sympathy to soothe my neighbor’s grief; 

O Lord, I do not ask a screen or mask, 

But Thy spirit as sunlight through a leaf. 




POET’S WISH 


If I had one brave, understanding heart— 

Just one with whom I could philosophize, 

And count our little thoughts, our how’s and why’s, 
And measure with our souls life’s science and art, 

I would give up the field’s gay plaids, the woods 
Fresh from the outbreak of spring green and walk 
There never, quite content to sit and talk 
As serious as shattered rain. Our moods 


Would not be tragic, but our feelings strong 
As lighthouses above blue stars. A church, 

A sanctuary we would build and search 
The heart of humankind. But oh, why long? 

My soul held your soul close one afternoon; 

Then you were gone—but soon came down the moon. 


( 97 ) 




COUNTRY WALK 


A grosgrain ribbon splits a lustrious hill 
Into and parts the shaggy manes of grass 
That spring has polished overmuch. I pass. 

A long imprisoned cadence drops down shrill. 

And damp plowed ground smells cool, fragrant, and 
fresh. 

The furrows in a corduroy tide 

Have unsuspected maxims to confide 

To me, their dust kin, child of their own flesh. 


( 98 ) 




THE ENEMY IN WAR 


Naturally one hates the enemy— 

The merciless deserve no sympathy. 

And yet deep in the hostile ranks they go— 
The good, the kind, the beautiful—no foe. 

Although majorities may lust to kill, 

A man or two must fight against his will. 


( 99 ) 




MARY’S CHILD 

(A Christmas Poem) 

My child and Mary’s—let them be playmates, 
Though all the children of the neighborhood 
Should whisper in my child’s ear, “Goody-good!” 
He will not mind; but silly, childish hates 
Will go with this new little Play-mate near, 

Whose father was a carpenter. He’s strong, 

And brave, and not a sissy. He’s along 
When toes are stumped to wipe away each tear. 

My child and Mary’s—let them grow up how 
They should. Let my child take the stress and strife 
As soldier-like as His Chum all through life. 

Oh, let them be such close comrades, and now 
As Junior sleeps among his Christmas toys, 

God, let him dream he’s like the Boy of boys. 


( 100 ) 




LUXURY 


Luxury is not spiritless gain— 

Insipid wealth that rusts while it yet gleams; 
It is the time one takes and takes in vain 
To sit down and parade one’s little dreams. 


( 101 ) 




DEEP WONDER 


Oh what could make a sky so hugely tall, 

A germ so microscopically small, 

And earth on such a vast, tremendous scale, 
Designed minutely to the last detail? 

I cannot think it mere coincidence— 

It shows an architect’s intelligence. 

This Thing, this Being—some, perhaps, would call 
It nature reasoning that God is all 

Too mystical, impractically odd. 

Then nature is another name for God. 

In doubtful moments when I would decide 
That death ends all it quickly is denied— 

The world is so impossible to me, 

If earth is so, oh what can heaven be! 


( 102 ) 




LOVELORN 


I am in love with life 
And life with me— 

But life is a careless lover, 

I can see. 

For he would leave me 
With the slightest whim, 
Yet I would cling 
Eternally to him. 

I would forgive his faults 
That cause me tears, 

If I could share his presence 
Through the years, 

But like most lovers 
Life and I must part— 
Oh can you blame my tears, 
My breaking heart! 


( 103 ) 




LINES FOR ELIZABETH BARRETT 
BROWNING 


Delicate you were, and frail;'but strong 
The spirit and the fire 1 that lit your being. 
Through hours long with pain a dreamer’s song 
Embroidered with a woman’s subtile seeing 
Was made as much immortal as its theme. 

Cloistered your life until he came, and dim 
Your silent, darkened room. The only beam 

Of daylight was the quickening spark of him— 

Him who stirred your depths and opened wide 
The closed shutters of heart with but a note 
Or word—who, calling on you, could not hide 
Immaculate emotions. So you wrote 
With trembling fingers in the candle light 
What all love feels but only you could write. 


( 104 ) 




RETURN 


It’s been so long—so long since I have prayed. 
Somehow I turned my back and walked away 
Briskly from God’s throne. I left quite gay 
And independent, strangely unafraid. 

My footsteps echoed on the palace floor— 

I did not care. Head high I walked down through 
The courtyard, past the gates, vanished into 
The shifting mob that mills outside God’s door. 

Ah, it took pain to bring me back to Him— 
Footsore and weary, in a beggar’s state, 

One day I reappeared outside the gate, 
Stumbled along the courtyard sadly grim. 

A rose lifted a recognizing face, 

The fountain spun a twinkling web of song; 
Hot, tired and weak I slowly trudged along 
To the King’s chamber, fearful of my disgrace. 

I fell at His feet. “Lord, I feel my wrong— 

I am a traitor”, I tried to explain; 

God said, “I did not want to cause you pain; 
I’ve just not seen your face, child, in so long”. 


( 105 ) 





RAIN 


Let the rain pat my cheeks 
With its slim, frail hands— 
I like it. 

I shall throw back my head 
Far. 

While the silly people 
Flee to their porches, 

I know that every rain-drop 
Holds a star. 

It will curl my hair 
And canter over 
My damp forehead 
With its tiny wet hoofs; 

I shall kiss 

Its cool, dainty fingertips, 
And watch 
Molten silver 
Pouring off roofs. 

So it is with tears. 


( 106 ) 




I shall rise 
Kite-like 

Above the earth— 

Soaring exultant 
Through rain 
For here are strands 
Of gray-blue thread 
Spun with silver— 

Yards and yards 
Unfolding, 

Crumpling and shimmering 
On the ground. 

I shall rise 
Triumphant 

While the world of men flees— 

Crying 

For the sun. 


( 107 ) 




DRAMA 


To watch the seasons merge from spring to winter, 
Who hasn’t, in that pageant, felt so small 
A spectator to see spring’s actors enter, 

And summer play until the cue for fall. 

What breathless dramas move upon the stage 
Of wheat-fields where high balconies of clouds 
Above them ache with summer rain and rage. 

Then slowly down the uplands creep the shrouds 
Of blue mist, and the brown leaves softly shatter 
On lawns like crisp, spilled cereal. Demure, 

Slow snow-drops start their stealthy little patter, 
And snow puts dust-sheets on the furniture 
Of a deserted world, and someone leaves 
The icicles, like prisms, on the eaves. 


( 108 ) 




TO HITLER 


Should you conquer Earth you would be small; 
Worlds innumerable reel by too tall 

For your ambitions. You cannot invade 
The boundaries of space, the barricade 

That shields the stars and scorns your battle-cry, 
And what are plains of earth to those of sky? 

Should you shatter Earth you would be nil; 

Death will defeat your steel, intemperate will. 

Time is the conqueror and time will fell 
The savage god to a forgotten hell. 


( 109 ) 




Only the seas on German shores will raise 
Their arms and whisper “Heil” and roar your 
praise. 

Batter the citadel of God and beat 
With the angry iron and witness the defeat 

Of man warring on God—for in an age 
Children in school will idly scan your page 

Of history. These will be your remains : 

Paper the hero—paper his campaigns. 


( 110 ) 





ORGAN AT TWILIGHT 


Where is the man whose soul is not set free, 

When through soft twilight come slow organ notes 
Set in a sacred hymn’s old mefody 

Full, gushing from the pipes, its throbbing 
throats ? 

Tones quivering like tiny frightened birds 

Come winging trembling flights like some sad plea, 
And thrill with power of impassioned words 
The lover of such sanctified beauty. 

Through fields in blurring twilight gently floats 
A shawl of song like dusk that clothes each hill 
With trailing tassels of long lingering notes; 

And all the shadowed valleys echoes fill. 


(Ill) 




Low, soothing, with a touch as soft as love, 

And woven like the fabric of a dream, 

They flutter down and hover like a dove— 

Unlocking flood-gates of dim memory’s stream. 

Except from heaven’s choir of angels bright, 

I think there is no sweeter music known; 

If there’s a man not flushed with warm delight 
At this, he’s not a being but a stone. 


( 112 ) 




INFANTILE VERACITY 


Bright noisy elves on sudden wings— 
O children are unsubtile things! 

And no adult hypocrisy 
Cheapens their aristocracy, 

And yet how children can devise 
Lies staggeringly great in size! 


( 113 ) 




EXIT 


God cast me 

In His magnificent drama— 

A new actor, 

Before an audience 
Kind and critical— 

A new actor, 

Spoiled and inexperienced, 

To play 

Tragedy and comedy— 

A new actor, 

Oh, I have played so many parts— 
Persons: 

Gentle and arrogant, 

Erudite and ignorant, 

Sane and ridiculous, 

Niggard and noble; 

And some were over-done, 

And some lacked feeling— 

So it went 
To the last act. 


( 114 ) 




I knew as the curtain fell 
I played with blunders, 

But there roared 
A waterfall of applause— 

And then, 

Flowers, 

Flowers, 

Flowers, 

I was tired. 

I did not mind 

If the footlights were extinguished, 
The costumes hung up, 

The grease paint packed neatly away 
In the little tin kit, 

If the show was over, 

If there was stillness 
In the dark, empty theater, 

My Director said to me, 

“Well done, 

Good and faithful!” 


( 115 ) 




THE HOUSE LOVE BUILT 


Love built a little house for me, 

And when I enter in, 

No earthly thing can touch me there 
Where love has been. 

The rooms were made for cozy nights, 
The hearth is snug and warm, 

The walls were built so straight and high 
To stand the storm. 

So let the wind and rain beat down, 

And let the storm clouds soar— 

I run into my little house 
And shut the door. 


( 116 ) 




WAR 


Acorns will fall. Pine needles will not halt. 

Nor shift of violet sands in desert sun. 

White shores will be washed clean by surf of salt 
And ruff of foam. The world is not yet done. 

But Death slinks through green meadows past the 
sheep, 

And hides his face behind an apple tree, 

To crush the quiet houses in their sleep 
Till little towns are shattered pottery. 

And further on the pitted cheeks of earth 

Are scarred the more. And ground creaks with 
great guns. 

And dirt reeks with the dead—and still more birth 
Of swords from ploughshares for the stumbling 
sons. 


( 117 ) 




Oh why are men so cheap and scorned and brief? 

Why must there be the pain and dread that grips 
The loved ones with their fearful dared belief, 

And dying groans from kissed and much-loved 
lips? 

Here where the calm chrysanthemums still nod 
Yellow and shaggy I on, bended knees 
Ask with the wonder of the Christ, “My God, 

My God, oh why hast Thou forsaken these?” 


( 118 ) 




WOMAN OR LADY? 


One day I flung these questions to my mind; 
What is a lady? What art, what design 
Lifts her above the rest of womankind? 

And so I wondered. I could not define 

A lady. And that very afternoon 

I had tea with an heiress. Luxury 

Was all around. Oil paintings. Etchings. Soon 

I mused: here, surely, is a born lady. 

And then she criticized a friend. To hear 
Such catty, cruel remarks! I’m sure I frowned. 
But reaching home I heard my kind maid cheer 
The sad cook. In that drawing-room I found 
A woman—wealthy, cultured, and presumed, 

In my kitchen—a lady unassumed! 


(119) 




FOR GOD AND ME 


There’s only room for God and me 
When sunset stills the world, 
Before the brunette night bends down 
Where once the long light curled. 

No one shall speak but God and me, 
The sunset and the birds— 

No other voices shall intrude 
To break the spell with words. 

I cannot look enough. I ache, 

I burst with lover’s pain 
To clutch the sky against my breast, 
And never let go again. 

The beauty of the sun-red sky 
Is so beyond our bearing, 

We shall be selfish, God and I, 

Alone, aloof, unsharing. 


(120) 




A HANDSHAKE 


A handshake is a brief circuit set up 
For a staid belief that anchors and imparts 
An upheld trust, a code, a lifted cup— 

A treaty signed and sealed with hands and hearts. 


(121) 




MIRTH IN MY DIRGE 


I am swift, sapless metal—and tameless 
Of all but the one dark pestilence; 

I, light-winged and quivering with loveliness, 
Shall shudder proudly, but the blind, intense 
Tears trumpeted on earth I shall not know. 
Dancing and dreaming, mad as autumn leaves, 

I shall be tangled, but with mirth I go, 

And like a vision caught as the green sea heaves. 

Ashes and sparks of me will rest in moss— 
Mighty and withered—unextinguished still; 
And so perhaps some tree will moan the loss 
Of a; wild, bright bird—impetuous and shrill; 
Lightning I was, but now a muffled glow, 

For I am caged—laughing—but none can know. 


(122) 




THIS HUMAN STRENGTH 


I wandered on until the haggard length 
Spent my strength. 

Sleepless I wandered, unassured and tired— 
Uninspired. 

Until I gave God intimate control 
Of this soul. 

Awe-struck I mused why I did not at first 
Quench my thirst. 


(123) 




ENVIRONMENT 


Valleys are by nature gay and snug, 

Designed to shut away the cares of earth; 
All snuggled deep and warm within the hug 
Of mountains, their philosophy is mirth. 

Mountains tall in white turbans of snow 
Hold quiet peace and calm for they conclude 
That solitude is kind to wounds and woe, 

And to the mortal ills of mind and mood. 


(124) 




SCIOLISM 


There is so much to learn, so much to know 

Of science and art of all the world’s great store— 
Deep knowledge one must arduously stow, 

And find it sneaking out the mind’s back-door. 

Of earthly erudition my own share 
Is one infinitesimal vain part; 

Lovers of books, can any dark despair 
Equal it! Oh how it breaks the heart! 


(125) 




GOD, YOU ARE STRANGE 


God, You are strange with Your great empty face, 
All made of clouds and of sky and of space. 

God, You are vague—but when I was a child 
I saw You well in my fancies wild. 

You sat like a king on the Great White Throne, 

And judged all the people who came to atone. 

But Your face was so blurred, like a piece of space, 
And You looked like a man with a phantom’s face. 

But now I can only look up at the sky 
To wonder how You are so wide and so high— 

And I am so tiny, and I am so small, 

God, You are strange—strange to see me at all! 


(126) 




YOUR VOICE 


Your voice! Your voice! The violins in your voice 
Will haunt my heart long after they have fled 
Into the wind and lost themselves. Unsaid, 

Bold rapture rises in me to rejoice! 

When words waltz off your lips my listening hands 
Gather them all like flowers, so they’ll bloom 
When velvet still hangs scent-like in my room, 

And in some pensive world my lone heart stands. 

Oh you are music! Body, soul, and all 
Of you! You strike an unsung chord in me 
That sets my being throbbing like the sea 
Until I shake like elms along the wall. 

Like silver splinters fall in slants of rain, 

Your lovely voice comes singing down my brain. 


(127) 





NO RESENTMENT 


Though life is impudent 
And bullies me, 

I don’t resent such 
Rude effrontery. 

Today I saw a blind man 
With his cup 
Smile limp, dull eyes 

And lift those starved things up. 


( 128 ) 





A GREEN SWEATER 


A green sweater that once embraced brown skin 
Has long hung in the closet of my heart, 

For I remember it more than your grin; 

It felt the beating heart of you. A part 
Of you it was—a thing as colored, warm, 

And rough as you were, till I surely thought 
I’d never see the day that time could harm 
The funny thing, but I was then untaught. 

How moth-eaten in spite of what I said! 

Though it meant more than< all the others wore; 
Amusing how I loved its every thread. 

Today I opened wide my closet door 
And how' I laughed aloud! That thing! I threw 
Your sweater out and hung up something new! 


( 129 ) 




AS FRIENDS WE COME 


As friends we come—the gentle Christ and I— 
Just friends who sit down in a shady place 
Beside an ancient well—He from the sky 
And I the dust but there’s no caste. His face 
Erect and ruddy turns to mine. My wall 
Of sin is Jericho again. His hand 
Rears pyramids of gold thought and lets fall 
White flakes of hope like manna on the sand. 

Too long I pushed Him on a throne so high 
I could not climb to it. “Wilt Thou descend?’’ 
I proffered. Thus it was he drew quite nigh. 

We talk as man to man and friend to friend, 
Until the desert sun stretches red wings 
And folds them into black and useless things. 


(130) 




EVACUATION 


I walked into your room when you had gone, 
Looking for dust and cobwebs of some part 
Of you that I thought hovered there. Black dawn 
Burst on me; a cruel shiver wrung my heart. 

I flinched to see that room—once so costumed 
In the gay tinsel of you—parched, lifeless, bare, 
And robbed of all it held. I had assumed 

This never could be—because you lived there. 

Stunned, numbed, I touched the curtains and the lamp 
Over your bed where you would nightly chase 
Dreams past stars; and your window where the damp 
Fragrance of rain hung on your sleeping face. 


(131) 




I knew your lovely hands had touched it all, 

But the gilt was dim; and not even pungence 
Of your old laugh came streaming down the wall— 
No remnant left of all your refulgence. 

I shut the door, with voices in my head, 

And dragged myself agedly down the stair— 
Defeated, hollow, desolate, and dead, 

Speechlessly withered—for you were not there. 


(132) 




LOST POEM 


Think. Life must echo soon in soulless dust— 

And we, bewildered, seek to understand; 

Vain bones must gallantly submit to rust, 

And men must melt their music with the sand. 

The sun spins on an endless tale of light, 

While storms of passion dwindle in the plush 

Of kindness in the pith of men; how trite 

The life that lacks love’s bubble-tone—and crush. 

When insincere applause dies in the wind, 

And our last domicles have roofs of grass; 

One with the dead I shall regret I’ve sinned 

Through centuries by letting warm dreams pass. 

There is a perfect song that we must sing, 

A soft still moment—now before decay; 

Two souls) must rhyme around a wisp of spring 
For we shall be a lost poem one day. 


(133) 




Now, I have sung my songs—mad, mellow things, 
And you have passed the portals of their pages. 
Poems are butterflies blown down the ages, 

The winds of time will waste their wanton wings, 
But I shall share them as stale crumbs of bread 
Now from my scanty cupboard. May they bless 
Your holy hunger for life’s loveliness; 

No heart, good comrade, is too fully fed. 

I trust you have not been barrenly bored; 

The amethyst and gold and sapphires blue, 

Enough to break the lovely heart of you, 

And what riches I had, I did not hoard. 

And this my epilogue: set them apart; 

Dear reader, we have met here—heart with heart. 

—The Author. 


(134) 

















































































